Portrait in Majesty

In honor of her May visit to Virginia to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the founding of Jamestown, Queen Elizabeth II decided to sit for a rare formal portrait. Her choice of photographer: Annie Leibovitz, the first American photographer so honored. The result was two historic pictures that capture the steadfast commitment and personal majesty of this remarkable 5-foot, 4-inch woman.

The Queen was said to be slightly astonished by the fact of her May trip to Virginia, to mark the 400th anniversary of Jamestown. After all, early in her reign she came to Jamestown to mark its 350th anniversary. This second visit, a full half-century later, underlines that for the Queen, who recently celebrated her own 81st birthday, a job for life really does mean life.

The Queen’s strength is that she has been so constant. For 55 years her country has been shifting like a kaleidoscope, and yet she has remained absolutely steadfast. Her moral courage was well captured in The Queen, a surprising film hit of last year, for which Helen Mirren was recently awarded an Oscar and a Golden Globe. Accepting the latter, Mirren charmingly praised the Queen herself for the way she has played her “role of a lifetime.”

She understands that less is more. That has led some to think that she is stern or unemotional. “Uncaring” was the word tossed about with gleeful abandon after Princess Diana’s death. It’s nonsense. She has strong emotions that, she believes, are usually better concealed. She is completely involved in the lives of her seven grandchildren, at least one of whom calls her “Super Gran,” and she will interrupt almost any occasion to take their cell-phone calls. At the reception following her son Prince Charles’s wedding to Camilla Parker Bowles, two years ago, she gave a warm and witty speech about his being with “the woman he loves.”

Throughout her reign she has been helped immeasurably by her husband, Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh. She fell in love with him as a teenager. Her parents were concerned, but she and Prince Philip are due to celebrate their 60th wedding anniversary in November. Those who see them together privately say that the relationship is still sparky and fun. Prince Philip, 85, has deliberately kept out of politics, but he has passions, many of them prescient—he was a dedicated environmentalist decades before that became fashionable, let alone dogma. Above all, he has been an extraordinary support to his wife. At a lunch in honor of their golden wedding anniversary, 10 years ago, she said of him, in a breaking voice, “He has, quite simply, been my strength and stay all these years, and I, and his whole family, and this and many other countries, owe him a debt greater than he would ever claim, or we shall ever know.”

The Queen was very close to her mother; they talked every day on the telephone—about family, horses, and, of course, “events.” But since her mother’s death, in 2002, the Queen has been the unchallenged symbol of the nation, and she has blossomed. Millions turned out for festivities on the occasion of her Golden Jubilee, also in 2002, and she can now be confident that her quiet Christian loyalty (her faith is crucial to her) and her clear sense of duty have gained her the affection of a new generation. Tony Blair, who admires her greatly, once said that her importance to Britain (and beyond) is that she represents “those values of duty and service that are timeless.” She is, he added, “simply, the best of British.” That’s right.